Tim Mayo
Tim Mayo’s poems and reviews have appeared in The American Journal of Poetry, Barrow Street Journal, Narrative Magazine, Poetry International, and Salamander among other places. His poems have received seven Pushcart Prize nominations. His second volume of poems, Thesaurus of Separation (Phoenicia Publishing, 2016) was a finalist for both the 2017 Montaigne Medal and the 2017 Eric Hoffer Book Award, and his chapbook Notes to the Mental Hospital Timekeeper also won an Honorable Mention for the 2020 Eric Hoffer Chapbook Award. He works at the Brattleboro Retreat, a mental institution, and is a founding member of the Brattleboro Literary Festival.
The Anthropology of Old Age
Recently, I’ve passed into a neighborhood,
where everyone knows their neighbor.
Wrinkles populate their faces like tribal scars,
although, for the most part, their eyes are bright
as ever. They’re friendly and very talkative.
Still learning their language, I say little: I smile,
make an occasional, commiserative grimace, mime
all the expected gestures that come with words.
They, in turn, seem patient, attentive to my clucks
and shrugs, as if they know, in the end, validation
courses through my veins, accepting them as they
are, despite my hesitance to voice my thoughts.
Evening comes, the daily chatter ends,
and everyone retreats inside,
counting in silence the days that are left.
I am still learning their mating habits,
though progeny is no longer their purpose,
learning the attitudes towards their now-grown
young, and those little people with large eyes,
who curl into their laps like folded hands.
